Does anyone else think EOD surcharges are too low for your average races?

At Wellington College recently they had loads of EOD, which started to cause issues with parking and map numbers. But if the cost only goes up from £10 to £11 or £12, then I guess there isn't a huge need to pre enter other than to "guarantee a map".

Personally I'd have a much bigger difference between the two - say +50% for EOD except perhaps for some of the beginner's courses aimed at locals. With most entry deadlines now a week before the race, surely most orienteers will be able to commit to coming or not when entries close?

Another way to deal with the potential EOD rush is to offer some sort of Map Reservation, but that can make things a little complex as this description for an upcoming event shows:

Enter by Sunday 13 January, after which entry fees increase by £2. After that, up to Closing Date on Wednesday 16 January entry is subject to map availability.EOD will be available at a further increased entry fee subject to map availability.“Advance EOD” will be available online until Friday 18 January. Advance EOD means you pay and register (as well as reserve your map) before you arrive on Sunday. If you need to hire a SI Card you will have to visit Registration, but otherwise you only need to discover your start time and can go straight to the Start. Advance EOD start times will be available at the event, and may or may not be available online before that.

Completely agree. I also can't understand why some (level C) events are EOD only.The (small) cost of setting up on Fabian4 must surely outweigh the extra work needed on the day.

With no pre-entry, Organisers have an impossible task of guessing how many maps to print. A number of events recently have had to recycle maps which is an unnecessary hassle/annoyance both to competitors and organisers alike.

Some level B & C event organisers give very little prior information before the closing date, such as course lengths, parking location and walks to the start/finish. All useful information if you have a family, or are older or injured, so that you can decide which course you'll enter and whether your children will want to walk 150m or 1.5k.

The Fabian4 charges are often covered for by the handful of people who pre-enter but dont turn up. Also they offer a service where you can countdown the map numbers, hence late entries can stay open til Friday.

Pre-entry (for experienced orienteers) seems like a great way to reduce volunteer time and stress on the day. We have debated introducing it at all our local events, as well as regionals. The problem is that there is inevitably at least 5-10% drop in attendance if there's no EOD, more for local events, and with gently declining attendances in many areas, organisers are often reluctant to see this.

Part of the problem is marketing - with some orienteers only noticing events the day before the event because we rely too much now on websites which don't "push" information in the way posting fliers on car windscreens used to.

A good compromise might be to make the regional event pre-entry only for courses light green and harder, but keep the fabian4 entries open late (many of our local ones have pre-entry up to 2 days before the event). Then use the extra volunteer time generated to improve marketing aimed at newcomers on the easier courses, and marketing aimed at experienced orienteers (even if it's just emailing the neighbouring clubs).

Gramp and Maroc run a system called EEE (Early Event Entry) for local events - e-mails are collected on the club laptop and the organiser then enters the details in other event - saves a lot of time on the day of the event. Map is guaranteed until 1200 (starts run from 1100-1300). No charge and if no show then not a problem.Last time for this system in usually the Friday evening or Saturday lunchtime.

Orienteering doesn't have to be unique. We should look at what other sports do but balance it against the expenses incurred by a club in advance.

I cannot recall the last time I pre entered a fell race mainly because I am not of a standard to considering entering championship races. However there is little outlay in costs for a fell running club in advance.

I always pre enter road races, many of them are full in advance. I still only get a race number, tag of some sort and a medal at the end but I feel I have made an effort to think and prepare for a race (shame I still tend to finish last most times-please leave the finish up for me I would like to cross it eventually!)

I am always happy to pre enter an O event and accept that sometimes I might not be able to attend on the day. For my money i would still like the map though, some organisers oblige, some don't. At the WCH regional race yesterday some courses were oversubscribed. If the pre entry fee is covering the cost to the club of the Fabian or SI fee then it would have saved at least three volunteers at the WCH event and allowed enough maps to be printed.

I've recently attended two events that were inundated with EOD. Both were beautiful sunny winter days and the most heavily over subscribed courses were the junior courses. I would imagine these juniors came with their parents, and many might not have been coming until the family en masse decided. If a £5 surcharge is added for adults, is it such a good idea if they are bringing juniors?

At one club, they deal with unexpected surges of EOD, by asking people if they mind their maps being recycled. The majority are happy to. In the past they have also taken names and addresses to send new maps to them after the event.

Typical cost of EOD at races in the South = £12?Typical cost of a map = surely less than £1?

I agree that you don’t want to make EOD so expensive as to put off people who want to come at the last minute, especially juniors (and I was positively surprised to see junior maps running out as normally it’s always Blue first and White / Yellow last.)

Considering this Forum is inundated with posts discussing the dwindling membership and attendance I would have thought the last thing we need to do is discourage attendance with an excessive surcharge.